Big Sky Conference

[GeauxSioux]

Now that the speculation is over and the Big Sky announcement is being made today, it is probably time to ditch the "conference speculation" thread and begin a Big Sky thread. I know there is one in the football forum, but the Big Sky is about a whole lot more than football. Today begins a new era at UND.

[coachdags]

Apparently good things happen to those who wait.....Go Sioux!

[bincitysioux]

Now that the speculation is over and the Big Sky announcement is being made today, it is probably time to ditch the "conference speculation" thread and begin a Big Sky thread. I know there is one in the football forum, but the Big Sky is about a whole lot more than football. Today begins a new era at UND.

But I started that thread over 4 years ago! And I'm pretty proud that it reached 139 pages!

[Risky]

I am still pinching myself. We are actually joining the Big Sky. Unbelievable. I can not wait . It will take a year to get to get the schedules figured out and then excitement will really take off. We are going to have exposure from coast to coast between Hockey and the Big Sky. And then to top it off we have ours Sioux Sports television network, Mid Con and Fox College Sports network.. This is going to be the start of a very special era in UND history. We had to wait through the transition period and then we got one huge Christmas present. I love the Holidays. Fans just need to hang in there for one more year (especially in football ) and then the party really begins. Congratulations to Brian Faison and President Kelly . A job WELL done.

[Risky]

The final present would be if we are able to tie into the Altitude sports network connected to the Big Sky. That would really be the icing on the cake. Fun times!!!!

[bincitysioux]

Anybody care to take a stab at how the division lines are going to be drawn?

For football, I'd like to see:

North/East

Eastern Washington

Montana

Montana St.

Idaho St.

Northern Colorado

North Dakota

South Dakota

South/West

Portland St.

Weber St.

Northern Arizona

Sacramento St.

Southern Utah

Cal Poly

UC Davis

Weber and Idaho St. could be assigned as permanent rivals, ala Pac 10/12 with their 4 CA schools.

Will there be 2 or 3 cross-division games? 2 would provide an equal number of home and away conference games each year and allow an extra non-conference game. But 3 would allow for more conference competition which could help sort out the conference champ with 9 games rather than 8. I think I'm leaning toward 3 cross-division games.

Will they go to divisions for basketball and other sports? I hope so. If they do, move ISU into the South/West division. With divisional play for basketball etc., we'd have 10 divsion games, and 6 cross-division games for a total of 16, which is what the current Big Sky plays now. Travel would basically be the same for all the current members, and probably greatly reduced for ISU, Weber, SUU, and NAU. This would also allow for lots of OOC scheduling flexibility for the Pacific schools to play Big West and WCC teams, the Mountain schools to play WAC and MWC teams, and the Dakota schools to play Summit , MVC, and Horizon teams.

Non divisional play in baskeball etc. would fill out the schedules nicely, but I think this is where travel would become a real burden for virtually everybody, much moreso than in any football alignment.

[bincitysioux]

How soon can we expect to begin conference play? Is 2012 workable or totally out of the question? I assume at the very least we will still retain the 4 games against USD, Poly, Davis, and SUU that year. Will Big Sky schools be "encouraged" to schedule the new members in 2012 (and maybe even 2011), with full competition starting in 2013. Gosh I hope it is 2012.

How about the rest of the sports? How far out do they schedule?

It is also worth noting that Montana St. is scheduled to play NDSU in 2013 and Montana in 2014, both games in Fargo. I wonder if Big Sky expansion will impact those games? Montana especially likes home games, and if the Big Sky does go to a 9 game conference schedule, that only gives them 2 potential OOC home games. Will they travel, or go for the home games that generate so much money for them? Someone remind me which years upcoming have 12 games schedules..............I know there is at least 1 or perhaps even two in the next 5 years.

If either of those games are cancelled, I'm sure the Sioux/Bison game proponents will be out in full force. And of course, North Dakota will be blamed for damaging NDSU's schedule, just like back in '04.

[Torpedo]

Anybody care to take a stab at how the division lines are going to be drawn?

For football, I'd like to see:

North/East

Eastern Washington

Montana

Montana St.

Idaho St.

Northern Colorado

North Dakota

South Dakota

South/West

Portland St.

Weber St.

Southern Utah

Sacramento St.

Northern Arizona

Cal Poly

UC Davis

Just assuming you meant to put NAU instead of SUU twice...

I think that would work well, but I would be more in favor of a direct East/West divisional split. This would be mostly the same with EWU and Weber St. switched... Looking at the geographical layout, a true East/West split would put Montana in the West with the 3 Cali schools, Portland, EWU, and probably SUU and NAU. This probably wouldn't work since then the strongest (Mont., Davis, Poly...just an opinoin) football schools would all be in the same division...so Montana would have to be in the East.

Now obviously something resembling an East/West split is likely what will happen, but I would expect the BigSky brass to do some shuffling to preserve rivalries and history that we, being new to the BigSky, are not too familiar with at this point...Still, this is all very exciting!

[bincitysioux]

Just assuming you meant to put NAU instead of SUU twice...

Thanks, fixed it...........

[bincitysioux]

Can someone also explain why UND couldn't bus to the Montana schools? I know it is something like a 10 hour drive to Bozeman and 12 hour to Missoula, but it is an easy one on Interstate all the way.

The football team bused to Dekalb this year, which is fewer miles, but a much more broken up route and actually more driving time.

Obviously not ideal, but is doable is it not?

[GeauxSioux]

Press conference will be covered live for free on fightingsioux.com at 3:00 central today.

[star2city]

Anybody care to take a stab at how the division lines are going to be drawn?

For football, I'd like to see:

North/East

Eastern Washington

Montana

Montana St.

Idaho St.

Northern Colorado

North Dakota

South Dakota

South/West

Portland St.

Weber St.

Northern Arizona

Sacramento St.

Southern Utah

Cal Poly

UC Davis

Weber and Idaho St. could be assigned as permanent rivals, ala Pac 10/12 with their 4 CA schools.

Weber St will likely push to be in the same football division as Montana, MSU, and ISU. There's a lot of history with those schools (all are charter members). Weber would want SUU as a permanent rival, and EWU would want Montana as a permanent rival.

The non-football divisions could also get dicey. Idaho State (Pocatello) has very poor air service with very small planes, so normally the teams bus to SLC, passing Weber State en route. Most likely, ISU and Weber would be traveling parters. If ISU was paired with UNC, perhaps the visitors could fly into Idaho Falls (which has Denver service) and then bus to Pocatello, but that would force Weber St to be SUU's travel partner. Not ideal. EWU isn't that much further from Missoula than Bozeman, so EWU and Montana could be viable travel partners. Bozeman has very good air service, so it might be best partnered with UNC.

That might make non-football divisions as follows:

Big Sky North

E Wash - Montana

Montana St - UNC

UND - USD

Big Sky South

Weber St - Idaho St

SUU - NAU

Sac State - Portland

[GeauxSioux]

13thWarrior posted this on Egriz...

[star2city]

Can someone also explain why UND couldn't bus to the Montana schools? I know it is something like a 10 hour drive to Bozeman and 12 hour to Missoula, but it is an easy one on Interstate all the way.

The football team bused to Dekalb this year, which is fewer miles, but a much more broken up route and actually more driving time.

Obviously not ideal, but is doable is it not?

Grand Forks to DeKalb was essentially all interstate (keep heading south once at Madison). They broke up the trip with a practice some where.

UND policy has been that road trips more than 500 miles (essentially to Omaha) must be by plane - except with written exemption.

Missoula is around 1000 miles, and depending on the time of the year (like November to May), the roads may be bad.

[star2city]

Will be interesting to find out if SUU will have to pay the exit fee. Interesting, that they certainly have no legal hesitation in leaving.

Tweet from Fritz Jarett:

Catching steam that UND will begin BSC play in 2012. Huge, if true.

Would love to see billboards throughout North Dakota with the "Welcome to Big Sky Country" and season ticket information.

Wouldn't be surprised if season ticket sales jumped 50-100%.

2012 home schedule could be: Central Arkansas, Montana State, N Colo, EWU, Sac State

2013 home schedule: SDSU, USD, Montana, Idaho St, NAU

[GeauxSioux]

Will be interesting to find out if SUU will have to pay the exit fee. Interesting, that they certainly have no legal hesitation in leaving.

Tweet from Fritz Jarett:

Would love to see billboards throughout North Dakota with the "Welcome to Big Sky Country" and season ticket information.

Wouldn't be surprised if season ticket sales jumped 50-100%.

2012 home schedule could be: Central Arkansas, Montana State, N Colo, EWU, Sac State

2013 home schedule: SDSU, USD, Montana, Idaho St, NAU

:D

[The Sicatoka]

Some are happy at achieving the summit.

Others reach for the Sky.

[Let'sGoHawks!]

Some are happy at achieving the summit.

Others reach for the Sky.

I love it! Can I put that in my signature line?

[The Sicatoka]

I love it! Can I put that in my signature line?

IM credit card information, including security number on the back.

[dakotadan]

UND fans on facebook may want to add the Big Sky Conference.

[mnbison]

Congrats on your invite to the BSC, exciting times for all UND fans.

[Teeder11]

UND fans on facebook may want to add the Big Sky Conference.

The Big Sky Conference is my newest facebook "Friend"!!!

[UNDvince97-01]

Some are happy at achieving the summit.

Others reach for the Sky.

That is awfully catchy.....I like it.

[bincitysioux]

Per Wayne Nelson:

South Dakota does not have a press conference scheduled Monday to announce it will join the Big Sky Conference.

Don't know what that means.

But the speculation still remains that South Dakota, UND and Southern Utah all will join the Big Sky.

Hope they're coming along for the ride!

[jimdahl]

Southern Utah, North Dakota join Big Sky

The Big Sky Conference is privileged to announce that the University of North Dakota and Southern Utah University have accepted invitations to become core members of the Division I conference.

Both institutions received formal invitations from the league Friday, Oct. 29, advancing a process that began when the presidents of the nine current Big Sky Conference core universities approved expansion plans at their annual fall meeting on Oct. 20. Both institutions will officially join the Big Sky on July 1, 2012.

The Big Sky Conference is also on the verge of announcing the addition of the University of South Dakota as a 12th core member. The Big Sky will become a 14-team football league and split into two seven-team divisions. The Big Sky does not anticipate losing any of its current nine core members.

“We are negotiating with South Dakota,’’ Fullerton said. “They want to be part of the Big Sky Conference and we want them to be a member. They are just awaiting a final approval process. Approval processes are different at each school.’’